Four Sisters of Hofei : A History (9781439125878)

by Chin, Annping

  Chang contrasted the “pure and prudent,” the “impractical and obstinate,” with another type, “men who are sloppy in character but have considerable talents and ability, men who are anxious to succeed and pushy to make a score”:

  When knocked together to get something done, they have loads of energy and are willing to do a lot of running around. One can trust them with short assignments, but if you give them a succession of serious responsibilities, they are bound to transgress important principles and bring ruin to our country.

  Ideally the two categories, men of learning and men of action, should not exist separately because, as Chang Shu-sheng pointed out, a person learns in order to put his knowledge into action and his action should always be an extension of his knowledge. He felt that there was universal agreement on this principle but only the Westerners understood how it worked. He told the emperor Kuang-hsü:

  [Westerners] have a firm and unbending disposition. But they do not engage in discussions of moral principles and human nature. When they investigate the nature of things and extend their knowledge, their mind tries to understand every bit of what they are studying. After they had investigated the nature of things, they knew how to make weapons. From making weapons, they went on to train armies. There was nothing they did not learn and no one that they did not learn from. Henceforth they would win every contest, every war, and do whatever they liked and go as far as they liked.

  Chang Shu-sheng noticed that as Western men “investigated the nature of things” (ko-wu) and “extended their knowledge” (chih-chih), their endeavors led them to wealth and power, not a deeper moral understanding. This was different from the Confucians. Confucian thinkers had been exploring the possibilities of “investigating the nature of things” and “the extension of knowledge” since the eleventh century, and in the end they all came to the same conclusion, that learning took a person back to himself, to self-understanding and self-reform. Chang was brought up on the books and commentaries these thinkers had written, but now, having witnessed what the Western nations had accomplished, he wondered whether there could be a different type of learning. It was plain to him that both the Chinese and the Westerner applied themselves to the quest for knowledge, yet one ended up sequestered in a makeshift dwelling brooding about his spirituality and inner virtue, and the other found himself conquering the world. The distinction between them was not fabricated and not an illusion, as some had claimed. This was one message he wanted to convey to the emperor. His other message was the urgency of the situation. The Western nations had gotten so powerful that Britain and France regarded China as “merely another province.” He wrote: “Having tucked their troops and steamships, guns and cannons under their arms, they crossed the ocean, heading east. All of these countries eye China like an aggressive cockerel.”

  Chang realized that his government had tried to respond to this situation. “We constructed naval yards to build ships, and we established agencies to simplify red tape. We are trying in every way to achieve efficiency.” Yet, he observed, “after many years, China still lags behind, completely unable to compete with the West on the same level.” He believed that this was because the Chinese had gotten only a “semblance” of Western learning. With only a semblance, China could not “create a path for herself”—she could not “march forth on her own.” In order to have a grasp of Western learning, Chang felt, students should begin early with a Western-style education. “Those who did not acquire Western learning from a proper school have only appropriated its skin and hair, its branches and knots; they know what is so but not why it is so.”

  Ultimately, Chang Shu-sheng would help to build one such school in Kwangtung province. Construction began in January 1882. A year later, when it was completed, he sent a report to the emperor. The school had four parallel rows of buildings, twenty-two dormitory rooms, bathrooms, privies, kitchens, a watchtower, and a teahouse. Altogether the cost was 16,470 taels of silver. He wrote:

  We have already decided on the school regulations. We are going to hire from the Fukien academies teachers in Western languages, linguistics, and mathematics to teach here first. Once the students have made some progress, we are going to ask Western experts to take over the instruction. Books and all the necessary equipment have already been purchased. As soon as the students are selected, classes can begin.

  In this memorial, Chang Shu-sheng again emphasized the importance of Western learning, suggesting that it might be superior to the traditional Chinese education. “Western learning is broad yet precise; it teaches one to be discerning yet reflective. By itself, it can enlighten the mind. And when you try to get to the root of it, it is none other than seeking [knowledge] collectively, in a critical and practical manner. It is not jostling each other in empty rhetoric.” He returned to the subject of “the investigation of things” and “the extension of knowledge” to make an even finer distinction between China and the West:

  When investigating things, the Chinese search for the noumenal principles in them while the Westerners seek [an understanding] of the actual facts. In areas of technology and applied science, the Chinese employ artisans while the Westerners dispatch their professionals. Those who look for principles tend to sit around and discuss metaphysics. It is easy for them to be drawn to idle talk. Those who hire artisans to do the technology pursue their work only with a sketchy knowledge of things. It is rare for them to comprehend how things are made.

  In conclusion, the governor-general called for a fresh understanding of what Western learning was all about: “It concerns itself with practical questions in contemporary society.” He believed that when Western learning “is not vulgarized or trivialized,” and when the Chinese “have thoroughly comprehended Western affairs and Western technology,” then they “can look forward to a time when true talents will flourish [in their country].”

  In his discussions, Chang Shu-sheng distinguished Western learning from some of its untoward outcomes. He also noted the difference between the spirit of the Europeans and their conduct: the Europeans were “practical” and “resolute by nature,” yet their behavior toward China was “predatory.” Having made this observation, he offered some practical advice: The Chinese had nothing to gain from imitating the West, but they needed to understand the source of its power. Westerners were greedy and aggressive, so China had to strengthen herself first, in order to reason the Western nations out of their offensive intent. By this he meant that to be in a position to reason, one had to be physically strong—an absurd idea, since it undermined the power of reason, but something China simply had to accept in the 1880s.

  Just how well China had to perform in a test of strength in order to be taken seriously by the West was a question Chang Shu-sheng faced in 1883. That year the French were stepping up their activities in northern Vietnam and were moving their troops closer to the Chinese border, near Kwangsi province, where Chang was the governor-general. Chang had been writing to Emperor Kuang-hsü about the goings-on along the frontier, urging him to be ready with a plan in case the French were going to make mischief. By early 1884, a showdown was imminent. Chang favored war because the secret reports his scouts had been sending him from the Kwangsi border had convinced him that China had a good chance of winning if she acted quickly and decisively. Reactions in the capital were mixed. A group of young conservatives, called the Purists, also wanted war. But these officials, with little experience in diplomacy and practical administration, were calling for war on principle, seeing the clash as a moral contest. Li Hung-chang, on the other hand, was pushing for a peaceful settlement with the French, arguing that the Chinese navy was not ready for a major confrontation with a European power.

  This was not the first time Chang Shu-sheng disagreed with his old commander. As the two got older and undertook greater responsibilities, their differences became more evident. Li Hung-chang, by reputation, was too quick to bend to practical necessity and too easily co-opted by the empress dowager Tz’u-hsi and her circle of
supporters. Chang’s conduct, on the other hand, was never contested while he lived.2 It is true that he was not well known like Li and so was not under close scrutiny. It is also true that Li often had to resort to shifty devices and underhanded maneuvers because of the nature and range of his enterprises. Still, their styles were different, and so were their modes of thinking and tones of thought. One was capable of chicanery and the other was not.

  Chang’s communications with the throne on the French question brought no result. In early 1884, illness forced him to resign as governor-general, but he asked to remain as military commander of Kwangtung. The Ch’ing government dispatched a leader from the Purist Party to take his place and to begin preparing for war. In the meantime Li Hung-chang botched his negotiation with the French, who thought that the Chinese government was acting in bad faith when, in fact, Li had not been honest with his superiors about the terms of the agreement.

  The war finally broke out on August 23, 1884, in Foochow harbor. The French navy opened fire, and within fifteen minutes, they sank or badly damaged all but two of the Chinese wooden ships. By the afternoon, they also laid waste to the Foochow naval yard. The Chinese commander was among the first to flee. Prior to this confrontation, the Ch’ing court had asked officials from the coastal provinces to send reinforcements. Kwangtung responded with ships and troops. But Li Hung-chang, the commander of the northern port, answered that he had no ships to spare, and that even if he had he would not be so foolish as to divert them to Foochow just to have them destroyed.

  It is unclear who decided to send the fleets from Kwangtung, the new governor-general or Chang Shu-sheng. That August, Chang knew he was dying. He continued to write to Peking and seemed more anxious in these letters. Either the problems had grown or he noticed more: army officers showing no discipline, senior officials expecting gratuities from their own staff, and people behaving like rogues. His last letter to the throne is moving. It was dictated to his confidential secretary on October 26, the day he died. Chang wrote: “Ever since my previous memorial, I have been seeking treatments everywhere. The medicine is not working. The more I worry about my illness, the deeper my gratitude toward Your Majesty’s kindness.” Chang told his emperor that he came from “a military background, among the poor and simple,” and that “it was the sagely rulers who plucked him from the common lot” and entrusted him with important responsibilities. He went on: “But now as Your Majesty and the empress dowager are distressed over the increasing foreign hostilities and the disturbances along the coast, I am heading toward my grave—just another horse, another dog, filling the ditch. I am going ahead now with no chance again to repay your kindness.”

  Even as he was going, Chang Shu-sheng returned one last time to those matters that were most pressing to him:

  In the last decades, the Russians have been encroaching on us from the north; the Japanese are spying on us in the East China Sea; the British are planning their move into Yunnan and Tibet from India and Burma, while the French are coveting Yunnan and Kwangtung from the west, by way of Hanoi and the coastal regions. We gaze in astonishment at these repeated incidents, and the situation has become more and more difficult to control. [We are shocked,] but we still carry on as usual. We still insist on dressing in our caps and gowns when fighting a fire and bowing ceremoniously when trying to rescue someone from drowning. If this is what we do, how are we meant to save anyone or anything from disaster? In recent years scholars are beginning to understand the ways of diplomacy, and they are talking about using Western technology to defend our coastal regions. There is, at least, universal agreement on this.

  When Westerners establish their countries, they start at the beginning and move to the end. They are not as advanced as we are in ritual practice and moral education, yet they have attained wealth and power gradually. This is because they have a command of both the substance and function [of their learning]. They nurture talents in their schools; they discuss government in their parliaments. Rulers and people are of one entity; above and below share the same mind and sentiments. They work on what is real and practical and avoid the abstract.

  Chang Shu-sheng wanted the court to know that technology alone was not enough to prepare China for any major confrontation with the West. When the French shifted their target from Foochow to Taiwan in October 1884, the Ch’ing government was again at a loss about what to do. So China seemed to have learned nothing from her humiliating experiences—she was merely gazing “in astonishment at these repeated incidents.” Chang Shu-sheng believed that to compete with the West, the Chinese, like their opponents, had to “start at the beginning and move to the end.” As he put it, “If you cannot tune a lute, then you have to change its strings.” Other men at the time made similar arguments, but they were writing for an audience while Chang Shu-sheng was writing to the emperor. Toward the end of his letter, he said:

  It is crucial that we do not vacillate and make a mess of things, and that we do not debate in the abstract and ruin our efforts. If only we could adapt unceasingly to change, then in time we could be more assured about the future of our country. When this happens, the day I die is the day I am born.

  We read Chang Shu-sheng’s passionate appeal with irony because we cannot believe that he died with hope. In the same letter, he told the emperor that he had been up all night—this last night of his life—brooding about Foochow and about Taiwan: “Even though I am saying farewell to the world, it is hard for me to rest in peace.”

  Years earlier, when the Hunan-born scholar and general Tseng Kuo-fan was sent to Shantung to suppress the Nien, he had a chance to work closely with the battalion commanders of the Huai Army. He observed that these Hofei men “possessed an excitable energy and high spirits but no trace of anxiety.” He wrote:

  Consequently I became very concerned. I feared that they were not able to take on the Nien bandits. [The philosopher] Chuang Tzu said, “Two armies facing each other, the pessimistic one is going to win.” [The T’ang strategist] Lu Chung-lien wrote, “The one who is anxious and diligent is bound for success. The one who is relaxed and is having fun is bound for failure.” Mencius also said, “We survive through worrying about adversity and perish in ease and comfort.” Later that year I became ill and was relieved of my military duties. The Grand Secretary from Hofei, Li Hung-chang, [having succeeded me,] was able to get rid of the Nien altogether, using the Huai Army. Thus the spirit of the Huai Army must have been ardent.

  The success of the Huai Army came as a surprise to Tseng Kuo-fan because according to Confucian and Taoist wisdom this simply could not have happened. That the army did succeed forced him to reevaluate his position. He wrote:

  I myself have always been partial to the view that emphasizes the importance of “having anxiety,” which goes to show that I have only known one thing but not the other. But now I realize that my views had been slanted and also that any theory, no matter how superior, cannot cover all grounds; that each has in it what is appropriate.

  Tseng Kuo-fan, in these remarks, expressed an ambivalence he shared with some of the best minds of his generation. He looked upon men like Liu Ming-ch’uan and Chang Shu-sheng with a “questioning and admiring gaze.” These fighters, he thought, managed to win wars and rise above the crowd purely on the strength of their “ardent spirit.” But he, like most Chinese, was brought up with the assumption that there was virtue in having anxiety—anxiety about one’s moral descent, about the skiddy road ahead, about not doing one’s best and not doing enough for others; anxiety about being unprepared, about having too much luck or too little humility. Older than Confucius, the assumption delineates the Chinese spirit—guarded and passive, perhaps, to critics and outsiders, but an essential and activating principle in the way the Chinese approach a problem and live their lives. So although Tseng Kuo-fan was impressed with what force and energy alone could accomplish, he was reluctant to part with this assumption. He posited no theory, having convinced himself that the two, venturing ahead and holding back
, need not contradict one another.

  Tseng’s understanding of the Hofei spirit needs refining because we find in men like Chang Shu-sheng a strong “trace of anxiety” in addition to sheer energy. Chang was anxious to go forward, yet wary about getting it wrong; but he always had enough pluck to risk a change. He told others that he made his name and fortune in soldiering, that he was not a scholar. Yet his analysis of China and the West—precise and smart, avoiding any abstract discussion and dogmas—exemplifies that of the best scholars.

  By Wu-ling’s time, very few people in the Chang household remembered Chang Shu-sheng. Two or three old servants who had fought the Taipings with him could describe what he was like, and also Ch’ung-ho’s adoptive grandmother, the general’s daughter-in-law, who had gone to Kwangtung with him in the 1880s. So it was primarily this woman, and through her, Ch’ung-ho, who had been keeping his memory alive in the family. Their return to their Hofei home was also important. Chang Shu-sheng’s shrine was placed there, in the residential compound. As a child, Ch’ung-ho had, on occasion, climbed on top of his altar, tucking her small body behind the ancestor tablets as she enjoyed a game of hide-and-seek with a friend.

  GRANDMOTHER

  CH’UNG-HO’S GRANDMOTHER was glad to come home from Shanghai. The Book of Lieh Tzu says, “There is travel and travel.” “There is travel to contemplate sights or travel to contemplate the way things change.” But then there is also “perfect travel,” which is “to find sufficiency in ourselves.” It was this perfect travel that the elderly lady was seeking when she took her adopted granddaughter and returned to Hofei.

  The grandmother was originally from an East Hofei family and later married a West Hofei man. Ch’ung-ho has never known her grandmother’s given name. In those days, it was considered disrespectful for youngsters to ask their elder relatives’ names. It was, however, perfectly all right to refer to one’s male ancestor by his posthumous name—his honorary title—if the throne had given him one, as was the case for Chang Shu-sheng. In the same way it was possible for children and grandchildren to know their elders’ religious names. Therefore, even as a child, Ch’ung-ho learned that her grandmother’s Buddhist name was Shih-hsiu, which means “knowing” and “cultivating.”